2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumHRC's foreign policy record
Last edited Sun Mar 6, 2016, 06:52 AM - Edit history (1)
As Secretary of State, in an era in which hawkish choices were pretty much always doomed to cause disaster, HRC:
1)Pushed for a coup in Honduras in 2009 to prevent a progressive president from being able to run for another term. Massive casualties in the coup and massive new restrictions on POC, LGBTQ people, workers' rights, free speech and reproductive choice.
2)Pushed for "regime change" in Libya. Got her way. Libya now permanently devoid of any hope of being a decent society.
3)Fought to keep troops in Iraq and Afghanistan for as long as possible, likely causing the creation of ISIL/ISIS in doing so.
4)Made sure U.S. recognized winner of rigged elections in Haiti, a reactionary crook who devotes himself to preserving the power of the Kreyol elite over the majority population there.
5)Did a few token things in a trivially small number of situations to pretend to help women and children on rare occasions, when doing so wasn't threatening to wealth and privilege of the 1%.
That's her record, folks.
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grasswire
(50,130 posts)That's a whole other facet of the foreign policy.
Divernan
(15,480 posts)I use the phrase "slave labor" which is really too generous. Slaves were provided adequate food, shelter, clothing, medical care as a practical matter of slavers protecting their investment. In Haiti, where the Clinton foundation has directed investment of tens of millions of dollars, workers at Clinton facilitated industrial parks are still living without electricity or water, years after the earthquake, and are paid a munificent $3.65 a DAY with no benefits, sick days, etc.
All those touching photo ops of Bill & Chelsea at openings of schools and medical clinics?
Here's the deal. When Bill/Clinton Foundation is "facilitating" (while skimming a very fat percentage off the top) corporations moving operations from the U.S. to primitive 3rd world settings, they funnel/facilitate $$$$ into infrastructure like industrial parks, roads, clean water supply, electric generating facilities and shipping ports as necessary for manufacturing facilities. Walmart, for one, came to Haiti after Bill delivered on the infrastructure. But Billy is a full service facilitator. He knows that corporations need workers able to read instructions and fill out reports, and who are properly inoculated and trained to avoid malaria, etc. Because high labor turnover hurts the bottom line. Hence de minimis schools and basic health care are part of Bill's full service package.
peacebird
(14,195 posts)
CoffeeCat
(24,411 posts)Hillary was endorsed last week by the founder of the neocon movement, Robert Kagan.
I'm sure he approves of everything you delineated in your post. Hell, he may have helped to plan some of it.
Kagan was one of Hillary Clinton's Middle East foreign policy advisers while she was Secretary of State.
peacebird
(14,195 posts)
ChairmanAgnostic
(28,017 posts)Nuland, the village idiot who insulted our euro allies, caused most of the trouble in the Ukraine, and created a neocon-based mess on every issue Hillary assigned to her.
ibegurpard
(16,685 posts)
Dragonfli
(10,622 posts)As a carpetbagger.
Lets break down the experience of both candidates shall we?
Bernie actually has more experience, quite a bit so
While caucusing loyally with the Democrats serving 8 years as Mayor of Burlington, 16 years in the United States House of Representatives, 10 years in the United States Senate;
where he served on many committees Representing the Democratic party such as the:
Committee on the Budget (Ranking Member)
Committee on Environment and Public Works
Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety
Subcommittee on Green Jobs and the New Economy
Subcommittee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
Subcommittee on Energy
Subcommittee on National Parks
Subcommittee on Water and Power
Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
Subcommittee on Children and Families
Subcommittee on Primary Health and Aging (Ranking Member)
Committee on Veterans' Affairs (chairman)
I can assure you, that after all those years as an elected official.
He has a great deal of experience, and unusually consistent beliefs within that experience for any politician
I dare say more so than Hillary on such matters with her limited experience as a first lady Which is not an elected or appointed position with no actual government responsibilities other than ceremonial ones, one and a half terms as a Senator in a State not her own that she actually knew little about before being groomed for the position, and a one term appointment as The Secretary of state, that term showing her experience to be not only ridiculously hawkish, but rather a negative for her, one might even even say "Kissingeresque"
That and a great deal of experience Spending her time cozying up to enough billionaires, corporations, hedge funds, and banks to become a multimillionaire, but I think that experience is a weakness as well and not a strength as she will be beholding to many of them for those millions of dollars invested in her.
TubbersUK
(1,439 posts)ostensibly for geo-political reasons but with, as you might expect, an underlying business agenda
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/10/how-hillary-clintons-state-department-sold-fracking-to-the-world
Onlooker
(5,636 posts)No wonder blacks are against Bernie, when his supporters frame Obama's record in such negative ways, as to even be against the Arab Spring and his efforts to help women and children.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)She pushed harder for those choices than anyone else.
And POC don't support any of the things I listed there-none of which, btw, did anything to help the Arab Spring or women and children.
Onlooker
(5,636 posts)... or do you think he was too weak to awt the policies?
ChairmanAgnostic
(28,017 posts)SHE bragged about turning around Obama on Libya. She owns it now, cuz she sure broke it.
CoffeeCat
(24,411 posts)She criticized Obama's foreign-policy stance, WHILE she was Secretary of State. Obama practically shot across her bow when he said that his foreign policy attitude would be to "avoid doing stupid shit."
She took to The Atlantic and excoriated him for not being proactive enough. And we all know what that means--not enough war.
Hillary's Middle East policy adviser, while she was SOS, was Robert Kagan, the founder of PNAC and the modern-day neocon movement. The neocons have been resting on the haunches--waiting for an "in" to take over Libya. It's one of their stated wish-list countries that they want to take down and control.
Hillary gave them Libya. Obama even referenced the fall of Gaddafi and the subsequent consequences, "Hillary's project."
Kagan was one of her foreign-policy advisers while she was Secretary of State. She's cozy with Kissinger and other warmongers. I bet Kissinger and Kagan logged in plenty of time on her private email server. I wonder if Obama was given the access, or if he was ever granted access at all?
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)Clearly the "deal" she made in getting out of the race in '08 was that she would get control of foreign policy. Every choice the admin made was always the choice she preferred(except for the times she wanted something even more hawkish).
President Obama has done some good things. I admire the man. But the foreign policy choices, other than not sending in the Marines to save Mubarak, were always right-wing and disastrous.
noiretextatique
(27,275 posts)What a ridiculous comment.
NWCorona
(8,541 posts)People just wanna stoke the fire but karma will have the last word.
noiretextatique
(27,275 posts)NWCorona
(8,541 posts)jfern
(5,204 posts)It's why Tulsi Gabbard endorsed Bernie.
If you want to take out Al Qaeda and ISIS, and they're in a 3-way war with Assad, you don't try to regime change Assad.
Nyan
(1,192 posts)not necessarily in terms of human lives (although that is certainly possible if you factor in potential proxy wars), but in that the policy has been testing Russia and China's patience, pushing NK further into desperation, asking too much of SK, going against the wishes of Japanese public, and not offering Vienam and the Philippines any prospect of sustainable economic development but heavy military spending on their part, in return for getting on the bandwagon with anti-China strategy, which currently, we don't really have a real leverage over because China has become such an economic powerhouse in Asia.
There is a possibility that the whole thing might come undone with outright conflicts here and there, but even if that's not the case, it's gonna use up our diplomatic credit, which we really don't want to happen. Mainly because we can't afford to have anything akin to another Vietnam War.
BreakfastClub
(765 posts)This is a common fault I see among those who constantly attack Hillary. I see long posts with nothing but conjecture and opinion about how "bad" Hillary is, and at the end it always says something like, "how could you vote for this woman?" Well, because what you are posting is your OPINION and it is not my opinion.
No, what you wrote is not "her record" and certainly there is no evidence for the odd motivations you assign to her. It's all opinion, conjecture and hyperbole. You also fail to recognize that Hillary wasn't a rogue SoS. She was working for the Obama Admin. I doubt she has the ability to trick Obama and cause him to do things he doesn't want to do. If you're logical, then you must agree that if Hillary is so awful for doing these things you claim she has done, Obama is far worse. And yet, he is not seen that way. So to me, it looks like someone is rationalizing their hatred for Hillary. You can't think of anything real, so you post opinions as facts in order to justify your anger, and you hope nobody notices. By the way, that is my opinion, just in case you can't spot the difference.
Ford_Prefect
(7,895 posts)quite well documented in the press, especially internationally, and have been many times remarked with references on DU.
Hillary the person, and Hillary Clinton the Politician, SOS and presidential candidate has quite a long history of acting in ways far more self serving, far more imperialistic, far less idealistic than her promoted image would lead one to believe.
In particular she appears to be far more hawkish than most Democrats seem to consider reasonable (my opinion based on commentary about her actions regarding Libya, Syria, and Iraq). She is a devotee of Henry Kissinger's interventionist, regime toppling foreign policy. That alone should give people of any political persuasion pause to consider just how much more war our planet, our economy and our people can tolerate, never mind those unfortunate souls in the path of invasion and the many blessings it gives.
This is not hate. I do not hold Hillary Clinton in the same esteem as say Richard Nixon, G.W. Bush, or Karl Rove. This is not a personal vendetta. This is substantial and considered opinion about the politician running for president.
If you doubt the OP or my comments you may certainly present your own in rebuttal. Facts we can discuss. Informed conversation may yet lead to enlightenment. If you wish to discuss the president and his many facets we can also do that under the same conditions. For the record I voted for him twice.
PonyUp
(1,680 posts)
tazkcmo
(7,300 posts)Broward
(1,976 posts)
Raster
(20,998 posts)oberliner
(58,724 posts)1. This is just a blatant lie. Even the myriad of anti-Hillary sources out there giving her flak about her response to the ousting of Zelaya do not claim that she "pushed for a coup" in Honduras.
2. Qaddafi was a dictator threatening a massive civilian massacre. The UK, France, and the Arab League all implored the United States to assist them in preventing this. "We will find you in your closets," Gaddafi said at the time, "We will show no mercy." What would Libya be like today if he had been able to follow through on these threats?
3. More BS. Everything about what you've written here is a lie. Hillary Clinton created ISIS? This is your claim?
4. So in this case, the US should not have recognized the winner of the elections? What are suggesting should have happened instead? The US should have intervened in some way?
5. Nice job reducing and minimizing everything positive that was accomplished during her time in office.
Trust Buster
(7,299 posts)Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)I said that the insistence on a pointlessly drawn-out "draw down" in Iraq, rather than doing the sane thing and getting the hell out(with as much equipment as we could carry)on 1/20/09 created the conditions that gave birth to ISIL/ISIS. Nothing remotely like ISIL/ISIS existed in 2009.
As to Haiti, we didn't just watch the process from a distance. The U.S. pushed for the elections to go forward even after the corrupt Electoral Court threw out every candidate who proposed anything even vaguely progressive or even slightly compassionate towards the black majority. ALL of the candidates allowed to run(with heavy U.S. involvement to make sure)were right-wing and Kreyol supremacist.
It's as bad as the Nineties, when Bill did everything he could to keep Jean-Bertrand Aristede out of power and wouldn't even let Haiti raise the minimum wage.
HRC has extensive ties to the ruling elites in Honduras. This been well-documented. She pushed for immediate recognition of the golpista regime(even though there was never any justification for overthrowing Zelaya, a man whose only crime was trying to rewrite the constitution so that the non-wealthy majority in Honduras would have at least some rights). HRC's fingerprints are all over what happened there.
These were the major foreign policy things that happened. None of the tiny humanitarian efforts came close to outweighing them.
And none of the hawkishness were the foreign policy Barack Obama promised on the campaign trail.
Are we supposed to say that Democratic foreign policy must STILL not be criticized when it gets reactionary and economic royalist? That mindset doomed us to Vietnam, for God's sakes.
Herman4747
(1,825 posts)
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Henry Kissinger on Hillary:
“She ran the State Department in the most effective way that I’ve ever seen.”
“I’ve known her for many years now, and I respect her intellect.”
“She’d [Sec. Clinton would] put me under a great conflict of interest if she were a candidate, because I tend to support the Republicans… Yes, I’d be comfortable with her as the president.”
oberliner
(58,724 posts)As did President Obama.
Herman4747
(1,825 posts)...if he didn't praise her, right?
oberliner
(58,724 posts)They generally seemed to be on the same page for the more part, though, so it makes sense that he would speak positively about her now.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)She has never said that she will rule out doing ANY of the kind of things Dr. Kissinger did to the world between 1969 and 1977.
She has an obligation to human decency to do so.
Trust Buster
(7,299 posts)the Obama Administration created ISIS. These Democrats have to adapt the talking point into claiming that it was Hillary herself who created ISIS. Besides being wildly historically inaccurate, this sort of nonsense evokes the famous line hurled at Joseph McCarthy during his despicable hearings when Stevenson asked "Do you have no shame sir ?' Ditto.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)I didn't say that "the Obama administration created ISIS"
criticizing HRC as SoS is entirely separate from the feelings a person has about President Obama, and it is time for the Clinton campaign to stop using the president as a political human shield).
HRC did more than anyone else to push for keeping U.S. troops in Iraq as long as possible(I strongly suspect we'd still be at full or near-full troop strength there if HRC had been elected in '08). It was the lingering U.S. presence, a presence that had no justification at all after 2004 or 2005(if it was ever justified at all) that created the conditions that built ISIS.
The Bush administration started it...and HRC pushed, with no justification, to keep it going.
BTW, if you are going to accuse me of inaccuracy, you shouldn't say it was "Stevenson" did you mean Adlai?) who said "Do you have no shame?" to Joseph McCarthy.
1) Adlai Stevenson played no role in the Army-McCarthy hearings whatsoever.
2) It was Joseph Welch who said "You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/welch-mccarthy.html
amborin
(16,631 posts)Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)peacebird
(14,195 posts)
